We can stem the pangs of hunger IF…

Church, Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund lead 100 charities in major anti-hunger campaign

Archbishop Philip Tartaglia of Glasgow has led Scottish Christian leaders in backing a mammoth new charity campaign to end world hunger.

The Enough Food For Everyone IF campaign highlights that hunger and malnutrition in childhood will trap almost a billion young people in poverty by 2025 if nothing is done. More than 100 UK charities and faith groups are backing the initiative, including the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund (SCIAF), and the Catholic bishops of Scotland. For the official campaign launch on Wednesday, Archbishop Tartaglia showed his support in an open letter that decried the horror of famine.

“Hunger is the greatest scandal of our age,” the letter, which was also signed by other Scottish Christian leaders, said. “It kills more people than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis put together. One in eight people on our planet—that’s nearly 1 billion people—go hungry every day, and 250 children die every hour due to malnutrition. Yet we produce enough food to feed everyone.”

The Scottish Church leaders say they are backing the campaign, the biggest of its kind since the Make Poverty History campaign in 2005, because ‘we believe we have a moral obligation to help the poor in our global community and play our part in relieving the injustice of hunger.’

The letter stresses the key aim of the campaign, which is to put pressure on Prime Minister David Cameron to ‘put hunger at the heart of the G8 when it comes to the UK this year.’

“This gives us an unprecedented opportunity to tackle hunger and make a real and lasting positive change to the lives of the poorest people in the world,” the letter said. “There will only ever be enough food for everyone if we all take action to encourage our leaders to make the right decisions on key issues like stopping land grabbing, cracking down on tax dodging and keeping their promises on aid and climate finance.”

Archbishop Tartaglia; the Right Reverend Albert Bogle, Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland; the Most Reverend David Chillingworth, the Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church; and Reverend John Humphreys, moderator, Scottish Synod of United Reformed Church, say they hope all Scots ‘of all faiths and none, will join us.’

“The time to act is now,” they write. “In Scotland we have an opportunity to play our part, and join with 100 organisations, faith groups and many thousands around the country who are committed to making 2013 the year where we see the beginning of the end of world hunger.

The campaign has also attracted many high-profile individual supporters, including Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

“Hunger is not an incurable disease or an unavoidable tragedy,” he said. “We can make sure no child goes to bed hungry. We can stop mothers from starving themselves to feed their families. We can save lives. We can do all of this, IF we are prepared to do something about it. IF we challenge our leaders to take action. IF they listen to us…”

The campaign was formally launched across the UK on Wednesday at high-profile events in Glasgow, Cardiff and Belfast with a showpiece finale in London at Somerset House, which was attended by more than 1000 campaign supporters.

SCIAF is a key partner in the campaign and its director, Patricia Chalé, said that ‘tackling the root causes of poverty and hunger have always been part of the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund’s mission to build a more just world, so I am delighted to be part of this exciting new campaign.’